Gratitude and an uncomfortable truth about revealing my drinking secret
Plus: language notes, white women and white wine, resource picks and (of course!) Finding Nemo
A month ago I did something that I never would have previously dreamed of: I publicly shared an essay about my years-long quest to quit drinking. As soon as I hit Publish, my chest tightened and tears brimmed. I texted my business partner and checked in with another close friend. In a way, it was a microcosmic summary of my recovery process to date: tell the truth, do the hard thing, feel the feelings, connect with others and walk tall.
While I could not have foreseen the outpouring of compassion for my candid share, part of me had sensed that it would be there. After all: “Alcohol? Never heard of it,” said no-one ever. Whether we drink or not, the overwhelming majority of us have some form of relationship with it.
The first thing that I want to do in this follow-up is express heart-deep gratitude to everyone who liked/loved/texted/DM’d/shared/called or otherwise responded with umpteen variations of Way to go/I see you/Thank you. I am feeling incredibly loved and supported. The volume of Me too messages also resoundingly confirm that my story is just one example of an emerging world of ‘gray area’ alcohol dependence.
Sharing about my journey — while not nearly as hard as breaking up with booze — was incredibly challenging. As I mentioned in this radio interview about it, I was surprised to see that people’s kudos were as much for my openness about my struggle as they were for quitting drinking. An Alcoholics Anonymous adage that this calls to mind is We are only as sick as the secrets that we keep.
Having divulged my secret, I do in fact feel less ‘sick’, as in less full of fear of judgement. To be clear, I see my drinking issue as a dependency struggle with an addictive substance, not a disease. The actual sickness is the shame and silence that prevented me from seeking support. Having now traveled to the other side of my fear and found kindness instead, I can affirm that telling the truth has set me free as much as putting down the bottle.
Even as I write these comforting words, however, there is another voice rising in me. The voice comes from a place that understands that part of why I have been able to access such tremendous generosity of spirit is not just about my bravery. This place understands that it’s also thanks to the fact that I’m a well-connected white woman with an unfortunate but socially acceptable weakness for (what else?) white wine. The voice is asking: is this support and kindness actually as universally accessible as you make it sound?
When I got past the first 30 days in a 100-day alcohol-free challenge that I did in 2020, I felt like a different person. I had not experienced Day 31 since years before wine became a daily compulsion and I felt awkward, vulnerable and unsure of myself. An image came to me of a baby bird freshly hatched: fragile, a bit stunned and in need of nurturing and protection. I realized that I needed to treat myself like a baby bird as I emerged into this new world of sobriety.
For most of my middle-class life, when I saw people in the street struggling with addiction, I did not identify with them. They did not seem like baby birds that had fallen away from safety. They just seemed broken and I didn’t know how to fix them. My experience has broadened this limited view. For all of the layers of bias and systemic inequities that still stand between me and them, such individuals now feel considerably less ‘other’.
I am now seeing that the otherness does not stop at the fact that I had a home to drink too much wine in and a computer to tell people about it with. My brush with this slow-moving liquid bullet and subsequent line of inquiry is indicating that the picture is far bigger and more alarming than individual instances of ‘substance abuse’. In a startling about-face for someone who was previously a committed Pinot Gris fan, I am coming to the conclusion that alcohol ‘abuse’ is a big ol’ colonial, patriarchal, capitalist cocktail that is actually abusing us. It’s going to require confronting these huge, uncomfortable issues in order to heal the epidemic of addiction currently underway.
It turns out that my train of thought is far from original. This eye-opening recent essay reveals that the Temperance and Prohibition movements were deeply rooted in progressive resistance to colonial oppression. Allied groups included Indigenous people, suffragists and abolitionists. Here’s a snippet: “Temperance was a weapon of the weak against imperialism, against predatory capitalism, and against an autocratic state that promoted and profited from ordinary people’s subordination to an addictive substance.”
As a feminist, my critical perspective on this issue to date has been more about taking easy swipes at “Mommy needs wine” culture than applying a more sensitive intersectional lens. I’m now taking a deeper look at how alcohol has fueled multiple forms of violence and oppression even as it renders many of us comfortably numb. I am starting to wonder whom it serves to have so many people immobilized by addiction. A brief online search tells me that the current annual global alcohol industry is worth a breathtaking US$1.5 trillion, and that the incidence of addiction and harm caused by alcohol is multiplied in marginalized populations.
Language also plays a critical role in othering and inertia when it comes to booze dependency issues, starting with how we name those of us who struggle with it: ‘alcoholic’. I apply quotation marks because I have mixed feelings about this word. I’ll start with what resonates: how it’s used in AA meetings. The famous “Hi, my name is (person), and I’m an alcoholic” has never failed to strike me as a deeply wonderful anti-shame antidote. It embodies the precise spirit that I wish was more normative in common perception and discourse around addiction.
This heartening statement is however predicated on someone’s willingness to label themselves in this way in the first place. For some, proclaiming that they are courageously working to end a dependent relationship with alcohol is profoundly liberating. It’s a radical act, clearly intended to subvert the sting of a highly stigmatized term. For others, it’s a deterrent to even walking through the door, thanks to its pejorative, polarizing qualities.
While ‘alcoholic’ remains a largely commonplace, unquestioned word, other judgement-fraught descriptors have gone the ‘person first’ route in recent times. Turns of phrase like “the homeless”, “disabled people” and “drug addicts” have thankfully shifted to “individuals experiencing homelessness”, “people with disabilities” and “people with substance use disorders”. The impact of literally putting the person ahead of their challenge is profound.
Outside of the AA context, alcoholic reinforces the ‘other’ mentality thanks to the common belief that ‘alcoholism’ is a disease, which implies something that you either definitively have or don’t. The newer descriptor of Alcohol Use Disorder (AUD) notably uses the term disorder, which feels more accessible, in that it implies a spectrum. As someone who did not identify with the stereotypical image of an alcoholic, and yet was experiencing a very real problem, this helped me to find myself and raise my hand.
I also want to say more about the slippery language of ‘responsible’ drinking and ‘moderation’. A damning news story happened to appear the same day as my essay. It details research findings about alcohol’s highly carcinogenic nature, the alcohol industry’s resistance to transparently sharing this information and the government’s foot-dragging on doing its part to protect consumers.
When confronted with the fact that there is literally no risk-free level of consumption of its products, the alcohol industry groups approached for the story pointed to the onus of ‘responsible drinking’ and ‘moderation’ on behalf of the consumer. It’s a sleight of hand tactic to which I respond: How can people be expected to ‘responsibly’ consume a product about which they are not provided accurate information? Is ‘moderation’ even a reasonable concept to apply to a toxic substance?
What if alcohol had food safety standards applied to it? We drink this highly addictive substance — ethanol, a known, level 1 carcinogen — that has literally zero warnings about these facts in its marketing or packaging. We ingest it into our bodies, like any other beverage or foodstuff, and yet we do not hold it to the same standards. Why does it get a pass in this way? Can we please relocate the onus of ‘responsibility’ to where it rightly belongs, with producers and the government?
Finally, I wanted to share a few more essays, books and other resources that I have found valuable, for my fellow sober curious and recovery adventurers.
“Enjoli” by Kristi Coulter was the first piece of writing about addiction that caught my attention and helped me to see myself in contemporary social tropes about alcohol. I had never previously critically considered how alcohol is marketed to women, or questioned the ‘wine is like duct tape: it fixes everything’ narrative that she so skilfully eviscerates. She further unpacks the double bind that women do indeed deserve a break and ‘me time’, but how positioning drinking as the answer ultimately sells us short. The essay is part of an excellent collection entitled Nothing Good Can Come From This.
I strongly recommended Quit Like a Woman: The Radical Choice Not to Drink in a Culture Obsessed With Alcohol by Holly Whitaker in my first essay. Other than to reiterate my adulation for this groundbreaking work, I also wanted to share that I received some very helpful peer coaching through her Tempest sobriety school.
Drink — the Intimate Relationship Between Women and Alcohol by Ann Dowsett Johnson is an equally excellent read that was particularly insightful about the negative impacts of socializing youth (in this case girls) to drink as teens.
In 2020 I did an invaluable 100 day challenge, hosted by the wonderful Belle Robertson. I believe that I stumbled upon her excellent blog by literally typing “thinking about drinking” (my biggest pain point) into my search bar.
As highlighted in the first essay, Laura McKowen’s The Luckiest Club has been my go-to meeting source (Tempest also offers this service, which I’m sure is equally great). I also wanted to recommend her book, We are The Luckiest: The Surprising Magic of a Sober Life, as another inspiring and insightful read.
A huge part of successfully letting go of alcohol was not just getting educated about its realities and taking breaks from it. There was also a component of unlearning — basically examining assumptions and triggers that we have around alcohol, including things like socializing, creativity and stress management. A classic in this genre is Annie Grace’s This Naked Mind. While it may seem deceptively boring or obvious in parts, it works its magic in a way that I can only describe as hypnotic. She also offers a host of online sobriety programs.
For those sceptical about how great life without alcohol can actually be, don’t just take my word for it. The title of this one says it all: The Unexpected Joy of Being Sober by Catherine Gray.
Readers familiar with these references may observe that all of the creators of the resources cited here are white women. As discussed earlier, my recovery is yielding new-to-me insights into the broader social justice implications around alcohol. As part of my de-othering quest, I am now going further afield to learn about diverse people’s experiences and histories when it comes to addiction. It’s well and fine that I have been able to access the stories and support that serve me and reflect my experience, however as Emma Lazarus’ famous quote notes, “Until we are all free, we are none of us free.” With that in mind, here’s what’s next on my reading list:
- bell hooks’ Sisters of the Yam: Black Women and Self-Recovery
- Helen Knott’s In My Own Moccasins: A Memoir of Resilience
- Mitchell S. Jackson’s Survival Math: Notes on an All-American Family
Just keep swimming
I often think of the line “Just keep swimming” from the fish-themed family film Finding Nemo as a way to remind myself not to give up when things are hard. Everything in life is a process, and like the sea, there is no end — we’re just swimming. The good part is that the more we swim, the more we learn, whether it feels that way or not at the time. A bang-on quote that recently popped into my Instagram feed sums it up: “Don’t wait until you’ve reached your goal to be proud of yourself. Be proud of every step you take toward reaching that goal.” It took me years to get here, and I’ve still got countless miles to go. See you in the ocean of life, friends.
Speaking of friends, a gratitude footnote. This and the previous essay were sharpened, simplified and otherwise improved by some generous readers. In both pieces, Vanessa Richards and Gigi Roddick contributed big-hearted reflections, smart feedback and invaluable encouragement. Big love to you wonderful people.
